Discussion Papers

An Open Access project

• Discussion papers will be published under Open Access (external link)  principles, to make peer-reviewed research literature available without cost barriers. NOTE: if research has been funded externally, authors are to check their original agreement to ensure this meets funder’s terms.
• Authors retain copyright and authors rights on works submitted and published, and grant City Building TMU license to publish and distribute them in the final produced format.
• Reproduction will be permitted under Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND license (external link) , which “allows reusers to copy and distribute the material in any medium or format in unadapted form only, for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator.”
• Papers will be created in PDF and published using the Toronto Metropolitan University Library and Archives' Digital Repository, which collects academic output from Ryerson, under the City Building TMU banner. The City Building TMU website will include an overview of the series with a link to the repository. Self-archiving by authors is not permitted unless it is via sharing the permanent URL from the Library's Digital Repository.

All papers will be published in perpetuity, and will NOT be unpublished at a later date.

Benefits of the RULA repository

1. Accessibility: all content in the repository is fully accessible to read online or download from anywhere in the world.
2. Discoverable: papers will be indexed with Google Scholar and easily found via search thanks to added metadata.
3. Sortable: papers can be filtered by category.
4. Permanence: all content will be assigned a permanent URL.
5. User data: the repository collects user stats, which are publicly displayed for each paper.

Who and what is eligible

Information presented can include completed research, research in progress or viewpoints from an academic perspective from any discipline. If the subject is urban in focus and is related to an urban issue, or the improvement of urban systems and/or communities, it falls within the acceptable definition of “city building.”

• Manuscripts authored and/or co-authored by current Ryerson faculty members are eligible. 
• Manuscripts co-authored by graduate students along with a current TMU faculty member are eligible. 
• Manuscripts authored by graduate students independently are conditionally eligible; in this case we request that authors contact us in advance with a short description of the proposed work to be vetted by our editorial team.

Two inaugural themes have been selected to guide submissions in the first year of the project: (1) Cities and a climate future, and (2) Urban pandemic recovery. Submissions may also fall outside these themes, based on authors’ expertise and current projects.

All authors are requested to include 3 to 5 takeaways in their conclusion relevant to the practice of city building.

Manuscripts must be original and unpublished, and not intended for academic publication (i.e. preprints) now or in future. They may, however, form a portion of, or be related to, works intended for academic publication in another form at a later date. 

First draft submission guidelines

The submitting author is solely responsible for communicating with City Building TMU and for managing communication between any/all co-authors. They are also responsible for the accuracy of all content in the draft, including names and affiliations.

1. Manuscripts must be submitted in Word format, no longer than six pages (not including appendices).
2. Images, Graphics and Figures:
   1. Images, graphics and figures must be copyright of the author(s), or available for use free of licensing.
   2. Figures that are not original require permission, obtained through the authors, from the copyright owner, prior to publication.
   3. Images and graphics must be supplied in high resolution format.
3. Style and format requirements--see guidelines (download).

Selection and peer review

City Building Ryerson will oversee the processes of selection, response and peer review.*

1. All submissions will be initially reviewed by minimum two volunteers from the City Buidling Ryerson Academic Council (i.e. full-time faculty members).
2. Submissions will be reviewed periodically, as the volume of submission demands. Applicants will be notified of the status of their application via email in a timely manner.
3. The selection process is not competitive and submissions will not be weighted; they will be evaluated based on merit and relevance to city building.
4. Following selection, the discussion paper will enter into peer review by the volunteer editorial committee. This process will take roughly one month. Please note there is no formal signed agreement required.
5. *Submitting authors are welcome to suggest alternative/additional peer reviewers based at Ryerson or any university. Additional experts may be invited to review if material submitted is technical to a discipline. Authors may submit manuscripts that have already been reviewed by external reviewers; in this case, City Building Ryerson will check with these reviewers before proceeding with publication.
6. Next, the author(s) will have approximately one month to respond to peer review queries and commentary, and to submit a final draft to City Building Ryerson.
7. If works are not accepted, they may be submitted again at a later date.

Getting to the final product

1. Prior to publishing, CBR will perform a professional line edit and basic fact check for accuracy. Authors may need to answer final queries. References will be published in the format provided; the editorial process will not verify references.
2. City Building Ryerson will perform design and layout, and create final PDFs.
3. City Building Ryerson will not redraw figures or create graphics--these all must be supplied in original format. However when possible, tables and figures will be reset in the fonts selected for the discussion papers series.

N.B. Authors will only be contacted in the case where additional materials and/or information is needed; no final review or approval is required in this process.

Contact us

Getting started is simple; eligible authors are invited to submit questions or manuscripts that meet our criteria at any time. Please email us at citybuilding@torontomu.ca or your established contact(s) at City Building TMU.

We look forward to working with you!